Page:How to Get Strong (1899).pdf/283

 ; the rumor ran that on one or two occasions, in the war with Bœotia, he had shown a determination which had covered the retreat of a troop. And again a courage in the city government, in opposing singly the popular voice, which had wellnigh ruined him. He is very poor, but then he is hardy as a soldier, and can live on a few olives;—usually in the strictest sense, on bread and water, except when entertained by his friends. His necessary expenses were exceedingly small; and no one could live as he did. He wore no under-garment; his upper garment was the same for summer and winter; and went barefooted. Under his hypocritical pretence of knowing nothing, he attacks and brings down all the fine speakers, all the fine philosophers of Athens, whether natives or strangers from Asia-Minor and the Islands. No one can refuse to talk with him, he is so honest and really curious to know. A pitiless disputant who knows nothing, but the bounds of whose conquering intelligence no man had ever reached; whose temper was imperturbable; whose dreadful logic was leisurely and disportive; so careless and ignorant as to disarm the wariest, and draw them in the pleasantest manner into horrible doubts and confusion. But he always knew the way out; knew it, yet would not tell it. The rare coincidence in one ugly body of the droll and the martyr; the keen street and market debater, with the sweetest saint known to any history at that time, forcibly struck the mind of Plato, so capacious of these contrasts."

Professor Harrison says: "With the exception of One, Socrates was perhaps the greatest teacher that ever lived. His school was the workshop; the gymnasium; the market-place; the street. Eminently a preparer, he was the first and fiercest foe of cram in all its shapes and forms. If he could make people think, he was perfectly satisfied, and walked away happy. Everywhere the broad mouth, snub nose, and bald head of this reformer produced dismay; for the people knew the volley of questions sure to come. His ambition was to plant seeds of moral and intellectual reform everywhere. With the ugliest face, he combined the most beautiful soul in the world; so pure and noble that he might have been honored as a saint. The Greeks loved him for three things: First, his touching poverty; cheerfulness; self-denial; his equanimity, which nothing could overthrow; his public talks, in which he strove to better his people; to influence young men for good; and to set a lofty example of robust poverty, in the